


Both are True

by alivehawk1701



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, I Will Go Down With This Ship, Inner Dialogue, Love Confessions, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:20:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25008334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alivehawk1701/pseuds/alivehawk1701
Summary: An explanation, to the reader, from Hannibal's POV, how he feels about Will. Set at the end of Series One with Will locked up. How can Hannibal do these terrible things to Will? Is there a way to understand Hannibal? Quick fic-let.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 5
Kudos: 10





	Both are True

A person can get used to anything in life. When again and again you are confronted with the same barrier, same path, same fear, it is only human to find a way to move forward regardless. To not just rationize but accept in your own reality the inevitability, the inescapable truth, of how things are, how they must be. As I had to do many years ago. I saw this as a transcendence away from struggle to a place of clarity, enlightenment, and peace.

All humans are dichotic in nature. The conscious and the unconscious. For some, like myself, the division is exceedingly more pronounced and each part has notably individualized, and at times, divergent goals. I can not deny that the only reason I am alive is by recognizing this and establishing a balance, a way to work in harmony toward a paramount, mutually beneficial goal: survival. This has been my main focus for some time. That, and perfecting my work.

I hadn’t anticipated meeting Will Graham. But the moment I did, it changed me. Changed us. The desire to be known, seen, and accepted, is also human. I am not beyond this. I recognized the opportunity for true synergy, for belonging, which any psychiatrist will tell you, is the drive for most sentient creatures. It was difficult to reconcile his desire for closeness with my darker side. It saw Will as only a threat. At first it was difficult convincing it not to kill him. Difficult to explain the significance of him. Our need for him. Though perfect in its clarity, in its pureness of pleasure and purpose, I bade it consider another possibility. Because of the negotiations I’d pursued with the darkest part of myself, Will was now a variable in our equation and would be, until the end. 

I’m aware of everything that happens in my body. I’ve always had a hyper awareness of it but have fine tuned the skill in order to monitor how others see me. I notice, and manage slight shivers, muscles twitches, hairs rising on the back of my neck, even pain, and can react, or not react by design. It was fortunate, when I switched to psychiatry, to already have a head start on the non-biased mirror to my patients.

The challenge, as I’d discovered, and revelled in, is the effort it takes to conceal these vulnerabilities from Will Graham. The tendrils of awareness I feel licking at my inner most parts are exciting, unexpected and deeply compelling. No one had ever come close. His talents place him in a singular category of human just as I am singular in mine. 

Will is in a cell now. Because of me. He will not understand. Not yet. And seeing him behind bars at the crescendo of all my efforts is painful but necessary. In his eyes I did betray him. If only I could tell him now, relieve his suffering, lay bare my true intentions. But there is no way to know how he would react to the truth, the truth I know he suspected, had felt with his special gift. He was drawn to it, to its uniqueness and its isolation, as I was to him. 

I can not reach him behind the bars. The one time I’d allowed myself to intentionally touch him on the shoulder, for no other reason than I wanted to and he needed it, was a memory I meditated on frequently. In those moments I am curious to expose the other part of me, previously so assured, to a larger possibility.

And now, standing in front of his cell, all I want is to draw his trembling form to my still assurity and quiet him. Want to offer him, give him, the peace I have. Want to consume the beautiful wealth of emotion and luminescence inside him and allow it’s abundance to disperse inside of me, between us. I want to feel, experience, with every nerve ending, all I can of him. From the smallest of hairs on my lips in concert with his, to the lighting of his spine under my fingertips, the heat of my breath wetting the skin of his throat. Want to hear the resonance of his voice, his exhilations of pleasure vibrating like music across his ribs to the drum of our racing hearts. 

These sensations are new to me. Very human. Simple. An increased heart rate when he meets my eyes, a fluttering in my stomach, an anticipation of his scent. And I like it. 

I am a monster. I do monstrous things. But I would never hurt him. I see us together. Very clearly. And soon, he will understand, understand why I had to do these things, unpleasant things, why it may hurt now. He will understand the truth behind all my actions; I love him.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm watching Hannibal with a co-worker and she doesn't understand the ship, thinks Hannibal is awful and a psychopath. I do not. This is my attempt to explain how he works. I find, as someone that has worked in the mental health field for many years, Hannibal's exact pathology puzzling. I don't think he fakes emotions, no, no, not at all . . . no psychopath alive would cry at music, it is indeed something else . . . I've not finished the whole 3 series so *hush* for now. Just peeking my head out, what?


End file.
